aftermac, you clearly misinterpreted what I was saying. I said nothing of hacking my own Macs! Indeed, if you've read my posts elsewhere on this site (and on other sites -- where I am also known as "JDW"), you will find that I am rather a purist when it comes to classic Macs. I cringe at the sight of hack jobs, gutting of classic Macs, etc. Heck, that's why I still use a Mac 512k machine, in its stock condition, with the original 400k floppy drive and 64 ROMs! I spent hours fixing up the 400k drive when other people would have either trashed the machine or put in an 800k drive with 128k ROMs. I am as purist as they come, folks! But that's me. And I am in no way able to police the world. If someone screws up a machine and puts it on EBAY, what can I do about it. And so, with this in mind, if you re-read my post above, perhaps my original meaning will become more clear.
I absolutely agree 100% with your opinion! That's precisely why I bought my own Mac512! I even received a Mac 128k motherboard with it, which I never use because the Mac512 is what the Mac128 should have been! The Mac512 is exactly the same as the 128, but with 4 times the RAM, making the 512 a really usable machine whereas the 128 is hobbled in comparison. And yes, I used to use a 128k Mac for day to day work in 1984, so I know first hand how hobbled it was when running some software or copying disks. Disk swaps galore!
But folks, my the main argument in my previous post above did not center on the topics I speak of in the two paragraphs above. My main argument was against the theme of this thread and its title, for reasons I explain in the last paragraph of that post. We cannot police the world, so there's no need to "mourn" about what we see on EBAY. (And no, aftermac, I wasn't saying you are a part of the "mourning crowd." I am referring to some other posts in this thread when I talk about "mourning.")